Keep Your Opinions to Yourself and Speak with Authority

     Frankly, your opinion doesn’t matter. Not if you are a Christian and your goal is to speak authoritatively to our culture on the myriad of social issues facing the world around us. Whether it’s gay marriage, legalizing drugs, the war on terror, or whatever issue is most likely to move you to engagement in the battle, the last thing we need is yet another opinion. Opinions carry no authority. Whether you are a Christian or not, your opinion is no more valuable than the next person's. What is vitally needed is someone to speak with authority. We need someone who can lay down an objective standard of right and wrong for us to measure the validity of every opinion on every issue. That someone is God, and he has spoken.

“Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son,…” Hebrews 1:1-2a

     The prophets of the Old Covenant foretold of the coming Son and he came and “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the Word of his power.” (Hebrews 1:3a) At his first coming he communicated to his Apostles the glory of the New Covenant and filled them with his Spirit to write it down in the New Testament. The close of the New Testament canon finalized God’s Word to man on every issue required of us to fulfill his will in our lives and in society (2 Timothy 3:16-17). God has spoken and his Word is final. Therefore, as Christians we are not called to share our opinion, but rather to proclaim his Word. When we proclaim his Word on an issue then we, like Titus, are to “Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority.” And “Let no one disregard you.” (Titus 2:15). Where the scriptures are silent, we have no authority, where the scriptures speak, we can speak with absolute authority. Learn the Word of God well enough to make a clear and accurate case based on the scriptures, and you will speak with godly authority instead of sharing another irrelevant opinion.